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Seven years after becoming a member of the Kent branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society (OSG), Shirley Sturdevant has risen to the rank of president.

"I came through this door one day and met some people who helped me with my own family history," Sturdevant said. "After a couple of years I decided to get involved because I wanted to be able to give back in the way people had given to me."

Sturdevant became a member in 2005 and took on the role of director on the board, representing the Chatham-Kent Lambton Essex district before becoming OSG vice-president in 2010. It's a position she held until June 2 when she became president.

"I took (it) as a vote of confidence that no one ran against me," said Sturdevant with a laugh.

OSG is focused on ensuring historical documents and records continue to be made available to historians through digital archiving and advocacy.

"We are advocating right now on behalf of the Library and Archives Canada mandate which is being changed due to the government," she said. "We're just trying to encourage them (government) to make sure archival records are accessible, and they are keeping comprehensive collections, rather than a selective collection."

If selective collections are made, Sturdevant said much of Canadian history will be lost.

A few years ago the group successfully fought, with the support of Senator Lorna Milne, to have the government release the 1911 census.

"Although the census may be released after 92 years," said Sturdevant. "There is nothing that says the government must release them. We are advocating that it should be made available."

Part of the issue is that people don't understand what the government means when they ask if those participating in the census will agree to have their information released in 92 years.

"If they don't check it off (as yes) to the government, that means no," Sturdevant said. "If you want your family to be able to find you, and family historians, they need to have access to that."

The group also works diligently to digitize a number of archives, church records, cemetery locations and headstone inscriptions for posterity.

"The majority of archival documents, and records and heritage records are not necessarily on the Internet yet, that's where smaller organizations like ours come into play," she said.

The society's Keeping and Valuing Ontario's Heritage project utilizes government and Trillium grants to assist smaller archival groups such as the Tweedsmuir Women's Institute, to digitize the scrap books and history of the members before making the documents available to the public, either for free or on a fee-per-view system.

"They have a different flavour of family history than you would get from vital statistics or your census," she said. "They are the day-to-day lives of the women and their families, and the projects they undertook over the course of their history."

For Sturdevant connecting ancestors to the present is a labour of love.

"I really believe we need to know where we came from and people who are gone need not be forgotten," she said. "Because it's like they are calling out, they want to be found."